In etymology the origin of a word is

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«Etymologies» redirects here. For the work by Isidore of Seville, see Etymologiae.

Etymology ( ET-im-OL-ə-jee^[1]) is the study of the origin and evolution of a word’s semantic meaning across time, including its constituent morphemes and phonemes.^[2][3] It is a subfield of historical linguistics, and draws upon comparative semantics, morphology, semiotics, and phonetics.

For languages with a long written history, etymologists make use of texts, and texts about the language, to gather knowledge about how words were used during earlier periods, how they developed in meaning and form, or when and how they entered the language. Etymologists also apply the methods of comparative linguistics to reconstruct information about forms that are too old for any direct information to be available. By analyzing related languages with a technique known as the comparative method, linguists can make inferences about their shared parent language and its vocabulary. In this way, word roots in many European languages, for example, can be traced all the way back to the origin of the Indo-European language family.

Even though etymological research originated from the philological tradition, much current etymological research is done on language families where little or no early documentation is available, such as Uralic and Austronesian.

Etymology[edit]

The word etymology derives from the Greek word ἐτυμολογία (etumología), itself from ἔτυμον (étumon), meaning «true sense or sense of a truth», and the suffix -logia, denoting «the study of».^[4][5]

The term etymon refers to a word or morpheme (e.g., stem^[6] or root^[7]) from which a later word or morpheme derives. For example, the Latin word candidus, which means «white», is the etymon of English candid. Relationships are often less transparent, however. English place names such as Winchester, Gloucester, Tadcaster share in different modern forms a suffixed etymon that was once meaningful, Latin castrum ‘fort’.

Methods[edit]

Etymologists apply a number of methods to study the origins of words, some of which are:

• Philological research. Changes in the form and meaning of the word can be traced with the aid of older texts, if such are available.
• Making use of dialectological data. The form or meaning of the word might show variations between dialects, which may yield clues about its earlier history.
• The comparative method. By a systematic comparison of related languages, etymologists may often be able to detect which words derive from their common ancestor language and which were instead later borrowed from another language.
• The study of semantic change. Etymologists must often make hypotheses about changes in the meaning of particular words. Such hypotheses are tested against the general knowledge of semantic shifts. For example, the assumption of a particular change of meaning may be substantiated by showing that the same type of change has occurred in other languages as well.

Types of word origins[edit]

Etymological theory recognizes that words originate through a limited number of basic mechanisms, the most important of which are language change, borrowing (i.e., the adoption of «loanwords» from other languages); word formation such as derivation and compounding; and onomatopoeia and sound symbolism (i.e., the creation of imitative words such as «click» or «grunt»).

While the origin of newly emerged words is often more or less transparent, it tends to become obscured through time due to sound change or semantic change. Due to sound change, it is not readily obvious that the English word set is related to the word sit (the former is originally a causative formation of the latter). It is even less obvious that bless is related to blood (the former was originally a derivative with the meaning «to mark with blood»).

Semantic change may also occur. For example, the English word bead originally meant «prayer». It acquired its modern meaning through the practice of counting the recitation of prayers by using beads.

History[edit]

The search for meaningful origins for familiar or strange words is far older than the modern understanding of linguistic evolution and the relationships of languages, which began no earlier than the 18th century. From Antiquity through the 17th century, from Pāṇini to Pindar to Sir Thomas Browne, etymology had been a form of witty wordplay, in which the supposed origins of words were creatively imagined to satisfy contemporary requirements; for example, the Greek poet Pindar (born in approximately 522 BCE) employed inventive etymologies to flatter his patrons. Plutarch employed etymologies insecurely based on fancied resemblances in sounds. Isidore of Seville’s Etymologiae was an encyclopedic tracing of «first things» that remained uncritically in use in Europe until the sixteenth century. Etymologicum genuinum is a grammatical encyclopedia edited at Constantinople in the ninth century, one of several similar Byzantine works. The thirteenth-century Legenda Aurea, as written by Jacobus de Varagine, begins each vita of a saint with a fanciful excursus in the form of an etymology.^[8]

Ancient Sanskrit[edit]

The Sanskrit linguists and grammarians of ancient India were the first to make a comprehensive analysis of linguistics and etymology. The study of Sanskrit etymology has provided Western scholars with the basis of historical linguistics and modern etymology. Four of the most famous Sanskrit linguists are:

• Yaska (c. 6th–5th centuries BCE)
• Pāṇini (c. 520–460 BCE)
• Kātyāyana (6th-4th centuries BCE)
• Patañjali (2nd century BCE)

These linguists were not the earliest Sanskrit grammarians, however. They followed a line of ancient grammarians of Sanskrit who lived several centuries earlier like Sakatayana of whom very little is known. The earliest of attested etymologies can be found in Vedic literature in the philosophical explanations of the Brahmanas, Aranyakas, and Upanishads.

The analyses of Sanskrit grammar done by the previously mentioned linguists involved extensive studies on the etymology (called Nirukta or Vyutpatti in Sanskrit) of Sanskrit words, because the ancient Indians considered sound and speech itself to be sacred and, for them, the words of the sacred Vedas contained deep encoding of the mysteries of the soul and God.

Ancient Greco-Roman[edit]

One of the earliest philosophical texts of the Classical Greek period to address etymology was the Socratic dialogue Cratylus (c. 360 BCE) by Plato. During much of the dialogue, Socrates makes guesses as to the origins of many words, including the names of the gods. In his Odes Pindar spins complimentary etymologies to flatter his patrons. Plutarch (Life of Numa Pompilius) spins an etymology for pontifex, while explicitly dismissing the obvious, and actual «bridge-builder»:

The priests, called Pontifices…. have the name of Pontifices from potens, powerful because they attend the service of the gods, who have power and command overall. Others make the word refer to exceptions of impossible cases; the priests were to perform all the duties possible; if anything lays beyond their power, the exception was not to be cavilled. The most common opinion is the most absurd, which derives this word from pons, and assigns the priests the title of bridge-makers. The sacrifices performed on the bridge were amongst the most sacred and ancient, and the keeping and repairing of the bridge attached, like any other public sacred office, to the priesthood.

Medieval[edit]

Isidore of Seville compiled a volume of etymologies to illuminate the triumph of religion. Each saint’s legend in Jacobus de Varagine’s Legenda Aurea begins with an etymological discourse on the saint’s name:

Lucy is said of light, and light is beauty in beholding, after that S. Ambrose saith: The nature of light is such, she is gracious in beholding, she spreadeth over all without lying down, she passeth in going right without crooking by right long line; and it is without dilation of tarrying, and therefore it is showed the blessed Lucy hath beauty of virginity without any corruption; essence of charity without disordinate love; rightful going and devotion to God, without squaring out of the way; right long line by continual work without negligence of slothful tarrying. In Lucy is said, the way of light.^[9]

Modern era[edit]

Etymology in the modern sense emerged in the late 18th-century European academia, within the context of the wider «Age of Enlightenment,» although preceded by 17th century pioneers such as Marcus Zuerius van Boxhorn, Gerardus Vossius, Stephen Skinner, Elisha Coles, and William Wotton. The first known systematic attempt to prove the relationship between two languages on the basis of similarity of grammar and lexicon was made in 1770 by the Hungarian, János Sajnovics, when he attempted to demonstrate the relationship between Sami and Hungarian (work that was later extended to the whole Finno-Ugric language family in 1799 by his fellow countryman, Samuel Gyarmathi).^[10]

The origin of modern historical linguistics is often traced to Sir William Jones, a Welsh philologist living in India, who in 1782 observed the genetic relationship between Sanskrit, Greek and Latin. Jones published his The Sanscrit Language in 1786, laying the foundation for the field of Indo-European linguistics.^[11]

The study of etymology in Germanic philology was introduced by Rasmus Christian Rask in the early 19th century and elevated to a high standard with the German Dictionary of the Brothers Grimm. The successes of the comparative approach culminated in the Neogrammarian school of the late 19th century. Still in the 19th century, German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche used etymological strategies (principally and most famously in On the Genealogy of Morals, but also elsewhere) to argue that moral values have definite historical (specifically, cultural) origins where modulations in meaning regarding certain concepts (such as «good» and «evil») show how these ideas had changed over time—according to which value-system appropriated them. This strategy gained popularity in the 20th century, and philosophers, such as Jacques Derrida, have used etymologies to indicate former meanings of words to de-center the «violent hierarchies» of Western philosophy.

Notable etymologists[edit]

• Ernest Klein (1899-1983), Hungarian-born Romanian-Canadian linguist, etymologist
• Marko Snoj (born 1959), Indo-Europeanist, Slavist, Albanologist, lexicographer, and etymologist
• Anatoly Liberman (born 1937), linguist, medievalist, etymologist, poet, translator of poetry and literary critic
• Michael Quinion (born c. 1943)

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

References[edit]

• Alfred Bammesberger. English Etymology. Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1984.
• Philip Durkin. «Etymology», in Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, 2nd edn. Ed. Keith Brown. Vol. 4. Oxford: Elsevier, 2006, pp. 260–7.
• Philip Durkin. The Oxford Guide to Etymology. Oxford/NY: Oxford University Press, 2009.
• William B. Lockwood. An Informal Introduction to English Etymology. Montreux, London: Minerva Press, 1995.
• Yakov Malkiel. Etymology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.
• Alan S. C. Ross. Etymology, with a special reference to English. Fair Lawn, N.J.: Essential Books; London: Deutsch, 1958.
• Michael Samuels. Linguistic Evolution: With Special Reference to English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972.
• Bo Svensén. «Etymology», chap. 19 of A Handbook of Lexicography: The Theory and Practice of Dictionary-Making. Cambridge/NY: Cambridge University Press, 2009.
• Walther von Wartburg. Problems and Methods in Linguistics, rev. edn. with the collaboration of Stephen Ullmann. Trans. Joyce M. H. Reid. Oxford: Blackwell, 1969.

External links[edit]

• Media related to Etymology at Wikimedia Commons
• Etymology at Curlie.
• List of etymologies of words in 90+ languages.
• Online Etymology Dictionary.

13 —
Etymology. What
makes it important for contemporary lexicology? The role and place of
borrowings in English word-stock.

Etymology
(Gr) — etymon («true science») + legein («speak»)

Etymology is the branch of Lexicology which studies the source of
borrowing and the origin of Ws, the processes of adopting new Ws.

Motivation for studying etymology: the memory can not be overloaded
with Ws, you may learn by associations.

The etymology of a word refers
to its origin and the historical roots of the term as a linguistic
form. Etymology, in general, is the theory and study of the origins
and history of linguistic form., it’s a science of true sense of a
w, studies the origin, history and changes in the meaning of the
word.

Studies the following
problems:

1) native ws and borrowings

2)
assimilation& its types and degrees

3) ways of enriching E
w-stock.

English
wordstock is rich and of mixed character: 70% of words are
borrowings!

e.g.
money < OFr monei < Latin. moneta

Chronological
periods of English:

—
Old English 5-11 c AD (Anglo-Saxon)

—
Middle English 1066 (The Norman conquest)* — 15 c AD

—
The New English (1475) — Modern English

According
to origin all the words are divided into 2 sets: native and borrowed.

Native
words fall into 3 layrs:

1)
wors of Indo-European stock have cognates (words of the same origin)
in different Indo-European languages

e.g.
members of family (mother, brother, son, daughter), parts of body
(arm, eye, foot, heart), periods of time (night, day), animals (cat,
wolf, goose), numerals.

2)
words of Germanic origin have parallels in German, Norwegian, Sweish,
Dutch, Icelandic… (cow, horse, fox, winter, summer, shop, iron,
deep, good, green..)

3)
words of Anglo-Saxon origin (later than the 5th century AD) have NO
cognates: bird (OE bridd), dog (OE dogca), boy, girl, daisy, lord,
lady, always.

These
are basic words in English, most frequent: 80% (be, have, i, you,
she, should..)

BORROWING
is the process and result of adopting words, word-groups and parts of
words always within the words

Borrowings can be classified according to different criteria:

a) according to the aspect which is borrowed,

b) according to the degree of assimilation,

c) according to the language from which the word was borrowed.

English
is called the recipient language as it «receives» the word
the «giving» language is sourse.

paper
(E) < papier (Fr.) < papyrus (Lat.) < papyros (Gr.) The
sourse of borrowing is French. The origin is Greek.

Loan
translations — words and expressions formed in the recepient language
acc to the pattern of the sourse:

mother
tongue < lingua materna (Lat)

sweet
life < dolce vita (It)

hand-to-hand
< mano a mano (Sp)

WHY
ARE WORDS BORROWED?

1)
to fill the gaps in the vocabulary (butter, plum, beet, karaoki,
sushi)

2)
to show a new shade of meaning > synonyms: love, like + admire,
adore (Fr)

3)
blind borrowings (no one knows why)

WHAT
HAPPENS TO BORROWINGS?

• Assimilation

the
adaptation of borrowed words to the new linguistic environment

It
is determined by 3 factors:

1)
the nature of contacts

2)
the time of adoption

3)
the degree of genetic proximity

Type
of assimilation:

—
complete (perfectly assimilated)

—
partial

(name
objects which dont exist)

(not
assimilated grammatically: datum-data, nucleus — nucleai)

(not
assimilated phonetically: garage-party)

(not
graphically assimilated: cafe, queue, picturesque)

—
Barbarisms (not assimilated at all): curriculum vitae (Lat), carte
blanche (Fr), siloviki (R), ciao (It)

English continues to take in foreign words , but now the quantity of
borrowings is not so abundunt as it was before. All the more so,
English now has become a «giving» language, it has become Lingva
franca of the twentieth century.

The etymology of a word refers to its origin and historical development: that is, its earliest known use, its transmission from one language to another, and its changes in form and meaning. Etymology is also the term for the branch of linguistics that studies word histories.

What’s the Difference Between a Definition and an Etymology?

A definition tells us what a word means and how it’s used in our own time. An etymology tells us where a word came from (often, but not always, from another language) and what it used to mean.

For example, according to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, the definition of the word disaster is «an occurrence causing widespread destruction and distress; a catastrophe» or «a grave misfortune.» But the etymology of the word disaster takes us back to a time when people commonly blamed great misfortunes on the influence of the stars.

Disaster first appeared in English in the late 16th century, just in time for Shakespeare to use the word in the play King Lear. It arrived by way of the Old Italian word disastro, which meant «unfavorable to one’s stars.»

This older, astrological sense of disaster becomes easier to understand when we study its Latin root word, astrum, which also appears in our modern «star» word astronomy. With the negative Latin prefix dis- («apart») added to astrum («star»), the word (in Latin, Old Italian, and Middle French) conveyed the idea that a catastrophe could be traced to the «evil influence of a star or planet» (a definition that the dictionary tells us is now «obsolete»).

Is the Etymology of a Word Its True Definition?

Not at all, though people sometimes try to make this argument. The word etymology is derived from the Greek word etymon, which means «the true sense of a word.» But in fact the original meaning of a word is often different from its contemporary definition.

The meanings of many words have changed over time, and older senses of a word may grow uncommon or disappear entirely from everyday use. Disaster, for instance, no longer means the «evil influence of a star or planet,» just as consider no longer means «to observe the stars.»

Let’s look at another example. Our English word salary is defined by The American Heritage Dictionary as «fixed compensation for services, paid to a person on a regular basis.» Its etymology can be traced back 2,000 years to sal, the Latin word for salt. So what’s the connection between salt and salary?

The Roman historian Pliny the Elder tells us that «in Rome, a soldier was paid in salt,» which back then was widely used as a food preservative. Eventually, this salarium came to signify a stipend paid in any form, usually money. Even today the expression «worth your salt» indicates that you’re working hard and earning your salary. However, this doesn’t mean that salt is the true definition of salary.

Where Do Words Come From?

New words have entered (and continue to enter) the English language in many different ways. Here are some of the most common methods.

• Borrowing
  The majority of the words used in modern English have been borrowed from other languages. Although most of our vocabulary comes from Latin and Greek (often by way of other European languages), English has borrowed words from more than 300 different languages around the world. Here are just a few examples:
  futon (from the Japanese word for «bedclothes, bedding»)
• hamster (Middle High German hamastra)
• kangaroo (Aboriginal language of Guugu Yimidhirr, gangurru , referring to a species of kangaroo)
• kink (Dutch, «twist in a rope»)
• moccasin (Native American Indian, Virginia Algonquian, akin to Powhatan mäkäsn and Ojibwa makisin)
• molasses (Portuguese melaços, from Late Latin mellceum, from Latin mel, «honey»)
• muscle (Latin musculus, «mouse»)
• slogan (alteration of Scots slogorne, «battle cry»)
• smorgasbord (Swedish, literally «bread and butter table»)
• whiskey (Old Irish uisce, «water,» and bethad, «of life»)
• Clipping or Shortening
  Some new words are simply shortened forms of existing words, for instance indie from independent; exam from examination; flu from influenza, and fax from facsimile.
• Compounding
  A new word may also be created by combining two or more existing words: fire engine, for example, and babysitter.
• Blends
  A blend, also called a portmanteau word, is a word formed by merging the sounds and meanings of two or more other words. Examples include moped, from mo(tor) + ped(al), and brunch, from br(eakfast) + (l)unch.
• Conversion or Functional Shift
  New words are often formed by changing an existing word from one part of speech to another. For example, innovations in technology have encouraged the transformation of the nouns network, Google, and microwave into verbs.
• Transfer of Proper Nouns
  Sometimes the names of people, places, and things become generalized vocabulary words. For instance, the noun maverick was derived from the name of an American cattleman, Samuel Augustus Maverick. The saxophone was named after Sax, the surname of a 19th-century Belgian family that made musical instruments.
• Neologisms or Creative Coinages
  Now and then, new products or processes inspire the creation of entirely new words. Such neologisms are usually short lived, never even making it into a dictionary. Nevertheless, some have endured, for example quark (coined by novelist James Joyce), galumph (Lewis Carroll), aspirin (originally a trademark), grok (Robert A. Heinlein).
• Imitation of Sounds
  Words are also created by onomatopoeia, naming things by imitating the sounds that are associated with them: boo, bow-wow, tinkle, click.

Why Should We Care About Word Histories?

If a word’s etymology is not the same as its definition, why should we care at all about word histories? Well, for one thing, understanding how words have developed can teach us a great deal about our cultural history. In addition, studying the histories of familiar words can help us deduce the meanings of unfamiliar words, thereby enriching our vocabularies. Finally, word stories are often both entertaining and thought provoking. In short, as any youngster can tell you, words are fun.

Библиографическое описание:

Жумакулова, Ш. К. The etymology concept in linguistics / Ш. К. Жумакулова. — Текст : непосредственный // Молодой ученый. — 2020. — № 51 (341). — С. 56-57. — URL: https://moluch.ru/archive/341/76828/ (дата обращения: 14.04.2023).



This article discusses the etymology of linguistics. Along with the department of etymology, special attention is paid to the concept of etymology, the history of the origin of words, their original meaning and significance.

Keywords:



etymology, etymon, etymological analysis, diachronic, synchronous.

In linguistics etymology is the study of the origin of a word and is based on the laws of historical changes in word structure and its meanings, sound changes, and morphological changes in words.

Etymology is one of the oldest branches of linguistics and deals with the history of the origin of words, as well as the meanings of words learned from artificial, compound and foreign languages. Etymology takes into account both aspects of a word, its form and meaning. Etymology is the study of the origin of words. The word is a combination of the Greek etymology, etymon — «truth» and logos — «word». [3]

According to encyclopedic dictionaries, etymology originated in ancient Greece in Plato’s Cratilus, where the term «etymology» was coined in connection with the Stoics. [2]

According to Karpenko, V. A. Zvegintsev defined the history of the science of etymology, returning to Plato’s Cratilus, arguing that the «natural» or conditional nature of words and the dispute over their observance were primarily true, i.e. the point of view that reflects the essence of what they mean, the Stoics put forward a new task before the ancient linguistics — the discovery of the true essence or nature of words. Thus, etymology implied that a new linguistic discipline, or the science of the true meaning of a word, was encouraged for its birth. [4]

Etymology is a very ancient branch of linguistics, and BC philosophers and philologists also studied the early history of the origin of words. The term «etymology» is probably associated with the names of the ancient Roman scholars Chrysippus and Varron. The true and original meanings and forms of words are determined by comparing them with words in other languages ​​and dialects that have the same root as the history of the language. [1] It explores the previous meanings and forms of words.

According to I. A. Buduen de Courtenay, etymology is defined as a science that deals with historical relations in terms of the structure of words and their essential parts. The scholar argues that the application of the concept of chronological sequence to individual parts of the grammar of any language should take into account the history of the language when comparing the state of a single material in different periods.

O. N. Trubachev explains that the etymology of almost every word is related to comparative grammar, and that this relationship is almost always complex and multifaceted, as etymology is a set of actions based on a set of data derived from comparative grammar. The etymology is provided by comparative grammar, and it can still add clarity and add much. Each etymology works with comparative phonetics, morphology, and word formation facts.

A. S. Karimov calls etymology the «biography» of words, the study of the history of their origin. [5] The true and original meanings and forms of words are determined by comparing them with words in other languages ​​and dialects that have the same root. In this case, the previous meanings and forms of words are studied in depth.

The term «etymology» is used in linguistics in two senses: lexicology, the study of the history of the origin of words in a particular language, and the first meaning and form of the word.

It is easy to identify the origin of new words, but it is much harder to know when an old word appeared and from which language or dialect it was derived. In determining the origin of a word, the word is compared with the sound structure and meaning of words in related languages.

The subject of etymology as a branch of linguistics is the study of the sources and processes of formation of the vocabulary of a language, including the earliest stages of its existence. [2] Over time, the words of a language change according to certain historical patterns, which obscures the original form of the word. The etymologist must create this form, relying on the materials of the relevant languages, and explain how the word came to be in the modern form.

Historical changes in words often distort the original form and meaning of the word, and the character of the word undermines the underlying motivation, that is, it determines the difficulty of reconstructing the relationship between the original form and the meaning of the word.

The purpose of the etymological analysis of a word is to determine when, in what language, on the basis of which word formation model, on the basis of which linguistic material, in what form and in what sense the word appeared, as well as on its initial form and meaning determines what historical changes have defined the present form and meaning. Reconstruction of the original form and meaning of the word is actually the subject of etymological analysis.

Etymological analysis allows the speaker to restore the meaning of a word that was previously unknown to him, reveals its origin, allows to restore the origin of words in a foreign language. History from any moment of life helps maintain the account. The history of language as a scientific history is the study of the history of social thought without a general basis for the history of discipline, material and spiritual culture, and, above all, the imagination.

Linguist V. I. Abaev described the main functions of scientific etymological analysis as follows:

− to compare the basic, non-derivative words of a given language with the words of these opposite languages and to study the history of the form and meaning of the word according to the main language;

− to designate for Latin words within a given language and their components (roots, stems, affixes) in the language parts;

− to determine the source of borrowing for borrowed words.

The etymology of linguistics is very complex and requires a lot of time and patience. Historically, we have to admit that there is a connection between words and things from a diachronic point of view. But their history is so deep that the ability to identify all of them is practically impossible. The main reason for this conclusion is that just as everything in the world is changing and evolving, as well as words. With this in mind, it is concluded that there is no connection between words and things, given the current state of language development, that is, from a synchronic point of view.

As can be seen from the above, etymology is closely related to areas of linguistics such as lexicology. But for an etymologist to be successful, he must have in-depth knowledge in almost all areas of linguistics. He must compare the data of different languages, both modern and ancient, with his own methods in comparative historical linguistics.

References:

1. Abduazizov A. A. Tilshunoslik nazariyasiga kirish. — Sharq, Toshkent — 2010. — 81p.
2. Варбот Ж. Ж. Этимология. Большая российская энциклопедия. Том 35. Москва, 2017. — 489–490с.
3. Irisqulov M. T. Tilshunoslikka kirish. Yangi asr avlodi., 2009. — 96–101p.
4. Карпенко У. А. Трансляция смысла и трансформация значений первокорня: монография. — Киев: Освита Украины, 2013. — 496 с.
5. Karimov S. A. Tilshunoslik nazariyasi. Samarqand — 2012. — 21p.

Becoming Interested in the Origin of Words

Words, like facts, are difficult to remember out of context.  Remembering is greatly
facilitated when you have a body of information with which to associate either a word
or a fact.  For words, interesting origins or histories will help provide a context. 
For example, a hippopotamus is a «river horse,» from the Greek hippos, meaning «horse,» and potamos, meaning «river.»

Indiana is called the Hoosier state, and its people Hoosiers.  Why?  In the early days, the pioneers were gruff in manner; when someone knocked
at the front door, a pioneer’s voice would often boom, «Who’s yere?»

If you were offered a Hobson’s choice, would you know what was meant?  Thomas Hobson owned a livery stable in seventeenth-century
England.  He loved his horses, and to prevent any one horse from being overworked,
he hired them out in turn, beginning with stall number one.  Customers had to take
the horses they were given.  Thus Hobson’s choice means no choice at all. (Pauk, p. 314)

Etymology is the study of the origins of words.  The English language is living and growing. 
Although many of our words have been part of our language for many years, new words
are added all the time.  Following are various ways our language is influenced.

• Derived from Foreign Words — English, in many cases, has been commonly expanded by incorporating foreign words
  into it.  Most of our language has ancient Anglo-Saxon or Latin origins.  Other languages
  have also added to our vocabularies.

• Additions through Technology & Products — Our words often reflect current interests, trends, and innovations.  One of the
  most recent contributors to our language has been computer technology, which has created
  words such as bytes, monitor, and disk.

  Another way new words come into our language is through the development of products. 
  Some examples include: Kleenex, Walkman, Scotch tape, Xerox, and Linoleum.

• People’s Names — sometimes when a person invents or introduces something, that thing becomes associated
  with the person’s name.  The person, through time, is forgotten while the name lives
  on in our language.  Examples include:

  • mesmerize — F.A. Mesmer, an Austrian doctor and hypnotist.
  • sideburns — an American English alteration of burnsides, Ambrose E. Burnside, a Union general.

• Words from Letters — The initials for the names of things may actually come to replace the names.  The
  initials become the words that represent the thing, concept, or group.  The following
  are examples of words that have developed from initials.

  • TV — TeleVision
  • DWI — Driving While Intoxicated
  • COD — Cash On Delivery
  • ZIP — Zone Improvement Plan

• Word Histories — Some words also have interesting histories.  Learning the stories behind the meanings
  is a good way to learn those words.  The following examples will give you an idea
  of how history can affect language.

  • footman — It was once thought to bring bad luck if a person stepped on the door threshold
    when entering a house.  Rich people hired a servant to stand at their doors.  His
    job was to guard against a guest’s stepping on the threshold.  The guard became known
    as a footman.
  • hooker — A synonym for prostitute.  The term became popular during the Civil War.  The women
    involved were camp followers.  General «Fighting Joe» Hooker approved their presence
    in order to boost the morale of his men.